


re/construction

by tsunderstruck (charbroiled)



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Aftermath, Gen, Ishbal | Ishval, Kindness, Male-Female Friendship, Mentioned Alphonse Elric, Rebuilding after War, Refugees, xiao mei is big now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:47:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22258189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charbroiled/pseuds/tsunderstruck
Summary: Mei visits Ishval to reconnect with Scar.Originally written for the Fullmetal Anthology project.
Relationships: Mei Chan | May Chang & Scar, Miles & Scar (Fullmetal Alchemist)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 41





	re/construction

The arid winds of Ishval greeted Mei Chang before she stepped off the train. Amestris was a country designed to touch the five pillars of the Earth, and Ishval was the fire; the desert, the hot country. She glanced around the makeshift station. There were more goods than passengers on the train; mostly wood, fertilizer, water and cornmeal. It’d been four years, and it still felt like reparations were just getting started.

“Miss?” The conductor standing beside the door was giving Mei a pale, nervous look. “Is that… your bear?”

Behind her, Xiao-Mei snorted as she stooped through the human-sized door. Xiao-Mei had hit her growth spurt at around the same time Mei had, and the tiny panda had outgrown even the most sizable of her littermates. Now Mei was the little Mei!

Mei laughed and patted the panda on the snout and flashed the conductor a smile. “Yes sir! Don’t worry, she doesn’t bite. Do you know the way to Farina Operations from here?”

“Farina…?” The conductor squinted. He was young, although older than Mei, and his cornflower hair and light eyes reminded her a bit of Al. “Oh, yeah. It’s the center of town, you can’t miss it.”

The reconstruction of Ishval was a military operation, lead by General Armstrong. Even with her resourcefulness and organization, it’d taken two years for refugees to start to move back into towns again. Mistrust and the occasional outburst of violence were still fairly common occurrences. If anything was in General Armstrong’s favor other than her formidable force of will, it was that the Ishvalans were ready to forgive, that she had Scar and Major Miles as outreach, and, Mei thought with some regret, that the bulk of refugees had still been desperate and starving, ready to accept whatever rations and jobs Amestris had for them.

It wasn’t hard for her to draw a parallel to her own clan. Thought they hadn’t been the victims of genocide, they were scapegoated, third-class citizens in the pecking order of the imperial families; and yet any handout the Emperor had given them, they’d had no choice but to take.

Xiao-Mei whuffed and nosed Mei in the side, picking up on her lowered mood. Mei ran her hand across the panda’s thick fur. “Don’t worry, little Mei. Change is slow, but everything is getting better. Hard work pays off!”

The building was easy to spot, painted with the crest and colors of the military. Mei waved past the guards, flashing them her own identification-- she’d been declared an emissarial equivalent to the state alchemists at age 13. The document included an explanation for Xiao-Mei as well, much to her amusement. The lobby was cooler inside, a lump of ice in a tray sitting in front of a fan with ribbons tied to it gave it an autumnal breeze feeling. Xiao-Mei planted herself in front of the fan with a long exhale. She was fine with humidity, but heat tired out out Xiao-Mei pretty badly.

“Can I help you, miss?” Mei leaned on the front desk. She didn’t recognize the secretary at all.

“Yes! I heard Major Miles and Mr. Scar are in town right now? I’m here on an official visit.” A tiny lie never hurt anyone. Anyway, since she was involved in the state, any of her business was official, right? “Do you know when they might be around?”

The secretary crinkled his brow, and looked down to the papers strewn over the desk. “Uh,” he said, eloquently. “The Major should be in his office. I don’t really keep tabs on, uh...”

“Miss Chang!”

She’d recognize that voice anywhere; loud, commanding, and to her memory, welcoming. Mei turned to see Major Miles crossing the lobby towards her with wide, purposeful steps. He was still wearing a military long-coat, even in his heat.

“Isn’t that uniform too hot?”

Miles wasn’t much for smiling, but he laughed. “No, not for me,” he said. He sized her up. “You must have grown two feet since I saw you last. What’s Alphonse feeding you?”

Mei felt the blush creeping up the back of her neck. What an unfair question to ask first off! “Bread and cheese! Dairy makes you tall and strong, right?” She flexed her arm demonstratively. “We don’t eat a lot of that in Xing, so I thought cheese was weird the first time I tried it, but I like it!”

Miles nodded, his mouth set in a thoughtful line like that made perfect, serious sense. His glasses were folded and tucked into his coat pocket. There was no reason to hide his Ishvalan heritage here. “It’s good to see you,” he said, tilting his hand at the door to indicate that they should keep walking, and started back the way he’d come. Mei hurried to match his pace. “What brings you all the way out here? Message from anyone?”

Xiao-Mei stood with a long-suffering sigh, shaking her fur.

“No, I just wanted to visit. Maybe help out if you need anything. Mostly I wanted to check on Mr. Scar... don’t tell him, but I worry he might be lonely sometimes.”

Miles nodded again, with just the hint of a smile. “You have a good heart,” he said, without further comment. “Scar’s out meditating in the courtyard. I’ll let you two alone for now, and see if I can find you a place to sleep. Tell me if you need anything.”

Mei peeked out into the courtyard. Scar was sitting cross-legged on a bench in his monk’s robes and shaven hair, his back to the door, his arms folded into his lap. Beside him sat a water bowl, where a stray cat, grey and wiry, lapped thirstily. Mei covered her mouth to stifle her giggle, and then slid out into the courtyard. The cat gave Xiao-Mei a disdainful look and loped away, tail raised.

Scar turned at the disturbance, but he barely had a chance for his eyes to widen in surprise before Mei threw her arms around Scar in a tight hug. Behind her, Xiao-Mei had a loud bark of approval and rose to her feet to envelope Scar in a bear hug.

She could feel Scar relax; although he wasn’t the giant from her childhood, he would always be twice her size. She thought of him as family. An uncle, an admirable man who strive to make the world a better place despite what it had done to him. She’d been told he used to be a monk, and she almost wouldn’t have believed it, except for how comfortable he seemed back in his traditional clothes, in his homeland.

“Xiao-Mei, sit down,” he said, gruffly, but not unkindly, and Xiao-Mei withdrew and sat next to them with a pleased chuff.

He drew back, his hands on her shoulders, to look her in the eyes. “You’ve gotten taller,” he said. Mei nodded solemnly. It was still hard to tell the tone of his voice, but there was the hint of a smile around his eyes.

“How are you doing? How’s Farina?”

Scar sat down on the bench again. Mei sat down next time; him sitting was invitation enough.

“It’s going well,” Scar said, after a moment. “Slowly.” He looked down at his hands, and the intricate tattoos of the Dragon’s Pulse that encircled his arms. Mei thought she knew what he was thinking-- the same thing that he had been struggling with since they’d met. How could these hands, which had destroyed so much, truly rebuild? The damage that Amestris had done to Ishval, and that Scar had done in retaliation, was irreversible.

Mei rested her hand on his shoulder. “I know you don’t think so, but you’re a good man, Mr. Scar. You don’t have to forgive to rebuild.”

Scar grunted, as much of an acknowledgement as she’d get out of him on that. As they’d been talking, the grey cat had returned, though it gave Xiao-Mei a wide berth as it circled back to the water bowl. Behind it, Mei could see a few more cats perched in the courtyard, warily watching the two strangers that had disrupted the ‘meditation’.

“Are you spoiling these strays?” Mei asked, with an impish grin.

Scar looked up, to study the assembled cats as though he was seeing them for the first time. “No. But no one else will watch out for them.”

“Hm... reminds me of someone else, from a long time ago.”

Finally, the tiniest bit of “The person I remember was self-sufficient and bright.”

“Still is. But even the most self-sufficient person needs help sometimes. You haven’t just been that person for me. You’re that person for all of Ishval, when they need it most. Maybe you don’t think of it as kindness, or as family, and that’s fine, because it’s a much bigger kind of support than that. You’re there when you’re needed, always.”

She glanced up at Scar’s face; his eyes glistened in the desert heat, and he was looking away from her, at the gathered cats, at Xiao-Mei, at the little town beyond with its little markets and its returning refugees.

“Hey,” Mei said, quietly, and rested her head against his shoulder. “Don’t cry.”

♦


End file.
